Tuesday, January 4, 2011

How did Rick dominate his elections?

Mark P. Jones at Rice University tells the story (link). Excerpt follows...

How Perry dominated his re-election races

Governor won another term with anti-Washington theme, well-honed media tactics

Perry's re-election and his current "presidential timber" status resulted from the use of a set of bold and unwavering campaign messages along with a campaign strategy that disregarded many traditional campaign practices.

Understanding Perry's 2010 gubernatorial campaign is of considerable value for two principal reasons. First, the campaign was quite successful, with Perry handily defeating both U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, an early favorite, in the March Republican primary and Democrat Bill White in the November general election.

Second, the 2010 Perry campaign provides a possible rough blueprint of what we might expect a Perry campaign for the 2012 Republican Party presidential nomination to look like.

Jones doesn't really explain what he means by well honed media tactics except to say that Rick didn't meet with editorial boards and all of that... but he sort of left out the part where Rick did no direct mail or paid calls as well... and he didn't really say what Rick did do other than the Home Headquarter network... I get the feeling like Jones didn't closely observe the tactics, rather he just read about the strategy. The strategy was basically the messaging + "let's do online and grassroots instead of offline and elites." The tactics were a lot more nuanced and impressive. Day to day, Rick and his team won almost every day in the primary and the general alike. The only days I can remember them not winning were related to national coverage of the Willingham case, that disastrous chicken suit day, and maybe the time when Kay's peeps cut that video of Rick basically sticking to his consistent campaign to make it look like Rick was callous and didn't know there was a recession... also there were a couple of really strong body blows from the print media that skewed all kinds of things and stretched stories to paint Rick in a bad light... there may have been a few other bad days, but generally Rick's team won day after day. Each editorial board victory for Kay or Bill White was actually a victory for Rick...

In terms of tactics, Rick just won almost every day with social networking and the like...

On the messaging, Jones gets it absolutely right. It was a simple Texas versus Washington message.

1 comment:

Hey now, campaign characters. Be nice. I know a lot of you on both sides, so I don't want any overly foul language, personal attacks on anyone other than the candidates themselves, or other party fouls. I will moderate the heck out of you if you start breaking the bounds of civility.

Twitter.com/rickvskay

Twitter.com/rickvskay

About Rick vs. Kay's Author

Both Texas born and bred AND a proud (some might say too proud) Republican, I have a keen interest in the Texas Governor's race in 2010. I wish to remain anonymous because I have good friends [read: GOOD SOURCES] on both sides of this race. Oh and I am for Rick. Kay simply pissed me off too many times.